


Blindness

by red_seabream



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: Angst, F/M, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-23
Updated: 2018-04-23
Packaged: 2019-04-26 20:03:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,306
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14409600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/red_seabream/pseuds/red_seabream
Summary: After losing his sight, Kanan struggles to learn to see the galaxy from a different perspective.





	Blindness

**Author's Note:**

> [Spoilers for the Season Two finale and the end of the series]

Hera leads Kanan back through the base to her quarters. He’d never realized that something so familiar could feel so foreign, sounds echoing off walls and equipment in ways that are difficult to track. His hand is gripping hers and he’s ashamed of how tightly he has to hold on. But then, his fingers are aching too where she’s holding him tight.

Back at her quarters she guides him down into a chair, then goes off to find the medkit. Kanan can picture the room precisely, yet it’s little comfort. A misplaced chair or sock could send him sprawling.

“Kanan, where’s your medkit?”

It strikes him then – he’s even more turned around than he thought. There are _his_ quarters. He reaches out in front of him, feels the hard familiarity of the desk, fingers tentatively reaching out to trace the tools he keeps out for maintaining his equipment.

“Bottom cupboard. Back corner.” He bites the words off, lest they reveal more than he’s ready to.

He hears more shuffling. Hera can be near to silent when she wants to be; it stings his battered ego that she’s making extra sound just for him.

“Figures you’d keep it somewhere inconvenient.” Her voice is brave, trying for joking and nearly getting there and his heart clenches hard at that.

Then her warm, bare hands are back on his face, carefully unwinding the bandages Ezra had applied. They don’t come away easily and Kanan can’t hold back a hiss as part of his burned flesh is pulled away.

“Maybe we should get one of the medical droids,” Hera’s voice, usually so calm and confident is uncharacteristically shaky, and he wonders how bad it looks. But he grabs her wrist before she can pull away.

“No. I trust you.”

Those few words. They mean so much between them. For years his trust was all he had to give, and he did so sparingly. But he’d trusted her, almost from the start, and it had only grown with time. What it meant now…

Well what it meant today was different than what it had meant yesterday. That, and everything else in his life.

He thought of Zaluna, and her sudden, tragic blindness. She’d weathered it so well. Kanan wasn’t sure he had the same strength of character.

He knows Hera can feel him trembling. For all his strength and effort and training he can’t stop his whole body from shaking all over. Kanan is _afraid_ , whether he’s willing to admit that or not. Afraid of what this all means for him now. And even more afraid of what that fear could do to him and everyone around him.

_Fear leads to anger_ …

So he tries to grab at all of that mess and stuff it away, like a heap of dirty clothes quickly jammed into a duffel before the light of dawn cracks the horizon. He’s got plenty of experience in _that_.

Finally, Hera finishes with the bandages. He can sense her in front of him. Her eyes on him. Her despair, rolling off her in waves like fresh blood seeping out from a wound.

His whole world is blood now, stained red forever.

But Hera is nothing if not good in a crisis. She takes her own pain and locks it down somewhere inside that big heart of hers for later, takes a critical look at the damage. He’s glad for that. Ashamed, and glad, because her grief is one of the few things that could well and truly break him.

“I can clean it up and re-bandage the burns with some bacta. But I really think one of the One-Bees should look at you. Maybe there’s something-“

“There’s not.”

The bitterness in his voice, sharp with anger, startles them both.

“Kanan,” Hera’s voice is so gentle, so tender that it makes him want to tear the room apart. She would give anything to help him, but there’s nothing she can do. Nothing anyone can do. This is his life now. And that thought rides on a wave of anger that frightens him all over again.

_Fear leads to anger… anger leads to hate…_

“Just… clean it.” He lets off a long breath through his nose. “Please.”

Knowing Hera as he does, he can all but hear the protest that she swallows back down. And then gently, ever so gently, she begins to dab at the wounds that were once his eyes. Kanan realizes too late the selfishness of what he’s asked from her, what it must be like to see someone you care for so broken and bloody.

He can feel the tremble in her fingertips as they light against his shaking face, but she’s strong. So much stronger than he is, than he ever could be. He’d known some of the greatest Jedi Masters of his time, but Hera’s will is a force all unto itself. She’s not afraid of her emotions, but rides through them. Weathers them and endures them and lets the experience strengthen her.

Something the Jedi could have learned from, he thinks bitterly. Instead of hiding behind their Code. No mantra had saved them, or will save him now.

But while Hera rides the wave of her pain, Kanan is drowning. He has one anchor left to latch on to: he won’t let her be pulled under with him. Won’t let anyone be pulled down with him. He’d walled himself off from people, from the Force once. He could do it again to keep them safe. Would do anything to keep them safe.

As he’s done a thousand times – a hundred thousand, probably – he falls into his breath. His centre. It’s different now, but it’s still there at his core, where it’s always been. From here he can begin the slow, methodical process of putting the walls back up. It’s the most Jedi thing he’s done since he watched his Master fall face-first in the dirt.

The bacta pack is cool against his skin as she finishes fussing with the bandages. “There. That should hold up until it’s time to change them.” Her fingers trail over his cheeks, dropping down to his shoulders. It’s a familiar cue.

“Thanks.”

Hera leans in to kiss him, as she’s done a thousand times – not quite a hundred thousand, not yet – and for the first time Kanan pulls away. It hits her like a slap and she pulls back, wounded in a way he doesn’t have to see to know.

“I can’t.” Kanan says with a little shake of his head. “I’m sorry.”

“No, no I’m sorry,” she says hurriedly, collecting the medical supplies back up into the kit. “I shouldn’t have.”

“I need some time to deal with this. Some space.” Some space to lock this down. Lock it out. Lock _you_ out, my love, for your own good.

“Okay,” she can’t quite keep the hurt out of her voice, that voice that has always sung to him. And he hates himself for that. Fear to anger to hate, just like that. “I’ll give you your space.”

Hera leaves quickly after that, but not before making sure he has what he needs within easy reach. He wants to reach out to her with the Force, but doesn’t dare with his emotions so mixed up. If he’s honest, he doesn’t need to – he knows what he’s done. What he’s doing. And Hera’s smart – she does too.

She’s good to her word, and gives him his space. Kanan can feel her aching, though, a hard wound right in the middle of her chest. Always the core of their family, she puts on a brave face for all of them. He can tell she’s read the rest of the crew the riot act because they all keep their distance. He wants to tell her he’s grateful for that too – but he doesn’t trust himself around her like this.

The distance is lonely, but it’s safe. They all politely stay off his toes.

Except Chopper, who seems to delight in stopping exactly where Kanan is most likely to bash his shins.

Still, he hasn’t been able to push them away like he’d expected to. Sabine is sweet, in that way that she is that always seems to catch people by surprise. She paints his visor for him; makes sure it’s textured so that he can feel the design with his fingertips.

Zeb is thoughtful, in that way that he is that no one expects. Somehow all of Kanan’s usual chores around the Ghost get finished without him.

Ezra is harder. Just, harder in every way. Like he always has been. There’s so much cloudiness that surrounds him now that Kanan can’t get through. He’s grown so much, taken on so much. But Kanan can’t thank him without admitting how much he’s failed. So they dance around each other and the heart of it all, and Kanan feels him pull away a little more each day.   

Is this what having a family is like? The Jedi never taught him anything about how to care for people you weren’t duty-bound to. Or how to care for people at all, for that matter. Just _don’t_ care about them, had essentially been the wise advice of the ancient Jedi masters.

Kanan had stepped off that path a long time ago. He hadn’t been able to rejoice for Master Billaba’s transformation into the living force after their clone troopers had massacred her. That pain had been so great that he’d tried everything he could think of to close himself off from feeling ever again. And it had worked, for a time.

Then Hera had gotten under his skin. Each member of the _Ghost_ ’s crew another little sliver in his armour.

Armour he struggles to fit back into now. Kanan holds the image of Rex squeezed into Stormtrooper armour in his mind.

_Looks a little tight, old-timer_.

He’d never guessed _those_ words would come back to haunt him.

And then the Bendu shows him the key to it all, and blows his walls wide open.

Where had all _this_ been in the Jedi temple? It’s like having his sight back, and so much more. The full spectrum. Perhaps if he’d completed his training he would have grasped at some of this sooner, but Kanan doubts it. The Jedi spent so much time looking at the light that they lost their night-vision. Likewise, the Sith dwelled so deep in the dark that a glimpse of light left them sun-blind. But there was so much in between, a depth of colour and richness that he’s shocked to his core that he’s missed so much for so long.  

He can see Hera’s surprise, her delight, to see him waiting in the copilot’s seat as they head out to find Ezra. It’s bright yellow, like sunshine on a clear summer day on a world with just the right atmospheric mix that turns the sky a cheerful blue.

But it’s nothing compared to later, when she turns out all the lights in her quarters and guides him to her bed. And he lets her touch him, to see him like he sees her now, with fingertips and soft kisses and even sweeter pleas. Her pleasure is the sun coming up again after a long night, bathing him in warmth and peace.

He learns to see the rest of them, too. Sabine is purple with splashes of orange, ferocity and sensitivity and inspiration and passion. Was this how she saw the galaxy? Shape and colour all around? Zeb is yellow-green, like his eyes. Big and strong and always courageous. Even Chopper, though he’s not alive within the Force, causes a noticeable ripple all around him, little sparks where he lashes out or a warm affection where Hera is involved.

Ezra is…complex. A shifting swirl as he tries to negotiate the world around him. And all of it tinged worryingly with an angry red like an infected wound. But he’s bright, and open and that gives Kanan hope; something he’d never taken the time to really, truly focus on before losing his sight. Ezra is their hope and that’s a lot for a young man to shoulder. He needs a teacher, a mentor, a _master_ to help lead him to the strength he’ll need, so he can find it for himself.

He tries to be that. For Ezra. For all of them.

In the end, he’s so proud of Ezra – for seeing, for understanding, for pulling Hera close and keeping her safe. Keeping them all safe.

_We’ll see each other again…_

And in the end, he keeps his promise. Just for an instant, but he keeps it. With the Force singing through him, with a love that is pure and selfless rushing through every atom of his being.

_This_ is what the Jedi missed, hiding behind their Code. This beauty and this strength that only comes from opening yourself up and letting other people fill in all of your missing pieces.

The Force betrayed him once. He’d believed that for years. It hadn’t helped him save the master that he loved. But it is with him now, true and strong. This time, he knows he can keep his family safe. The way he knows the sun will come up again on Lothal tomorrow, despite the darkness. A deep a sacred truth, etched somewhere inside of his bones.

He sees it all, through the Force – and then, he opens his eyes and he can _see_ – not through the Force, but as himself. One last time.

The last thing Kanan Jarrus – the last thing _Caleb Dume_ – sees is the face of his love, beautiful and horrified and surrounded by light. And she knows he loves her, the way she knows the sun will come up again. Despite the darkness.

It’s enough.

He’s finally… enough.


End file.
